Thomas Cowperthwait Eakins
(July 25, 1844 – June 25, 1916) was an American realist
painter, photographer, sculptor, and fine arts educator. He is
widely acknowledged to be one of the most important artists in
American art history.

Born in Philadelphia, he passed the
major part of his life there with the exception of a period of
training in Europe, 1866–70. He studied in Paris with
Gérôme,
but learned most from the Spanish painters
Velázquez and
Ribera,
absorbing a precise and uncompromising sense for
actuality which he applied to portraiture and genre pictures of the
life of his native city (boating and bathing were favorite
themes).

He began teaching at the Pennsylvania
Academy of Fine Arts in 1876 and was attacked for his radical
ideas, particularly his insistence on working from nude models. In
1886 he was forced to resign after allowing a mixed class to draw
from a completely nude male model. Eakins's quest for realism led
him to study anatomy and make full use of Muybridge's photographic
researches, but the scientific bent in his work is of less
importance than his honesty and depth of characterization. His
portraits are often compared to
Rembrandt's
because of their dramatic play of somber lighting and sense of
inner truth. The most famous of his paintings is The Gross
Clinic (Jefferson Medical Coll., Philadelphia, 1875), which
aroused controversy because of its unsparing depiction of surgery,
an experience that was repeated with The Agnew Clinic
(University of Pennsylvania, 1889).

Because of financial support from his
father, Eakins could continue on his chosen course despite public
abuse, but much of his later career was spent working in bitter
isolation. It was only near the end of his life that he achieved
recognition as a great master, and in the first two decades of the
20th century his desire to `peer deeper into the heart of American
life' was reflected in the work of the
Ashcan
School and other
Realist painters.

As well as being a painter and
photographer, Eakins also made a few sculptures. His wife,
Susan Hannah Macdowell Eakins (1851–1938),
whom he married in 1884, was also a painter and photographer, as
well as an accomplished pianist.

All images, pictures, etc. contained here are gleaned from Usenet, or
some other public access archive. We believe all entries to be in the
public domain and, therefore, are without restriction for personal use.
Should you want to use any image on this site for commercial
purposes, you will need to consult with a competent attorney to determine
your rights. If you see errors or omissions (e.g., missing artists, artist
not cross-referenced by century or ethnicity), or if you own the copyright
to an image displayed here, please contact us.